ChocolateHeaven

Banter 18: Recurring themes

A common theme of this blog is to blather on about the past like old war stories regurgitated from a rocking-chair bound pensioner. So this month’s blog banter about evolving play-styles is right up my alley.

First, there’s some preamble. I play with many accounts. I’m not going to detail the styles of play for all of the characters I have because most of them are really new, and I don’t really want them to be known openly. I’m going to focus on what I consider a ‘duality of mains’, meaning both Adrielle Firewalker and Kalahari Wayrest, though it should be noted that for the first year of EVE, the latter was not played by myself.

So, lets get on with it!

Adrielle

Adri really started with the aim of mining up a storm – a contradiction in terms, for sure – to get herself and her friends – my friends – into cruisers and battleships as quickly as possible. Things were simple (and unbalanced) back then. Having a battleship was the awesomest thing; it had more turrets/high slots than anything else, and those turrets could hit fast moving frigates without any trouble.

In YC106 (2004), CCP changed the mechanics for pewpew with signature radius, so battleships were much less likely to hit smaller ships.

The natural progression of this kind of play was to help people out in whatever they wanted to do next, and despite one prenatal abortion of a corp (that I won’t go into detail about), its worked out quite well.

Primarily people wanted to roleplay, so I helped with that while focusing on industrial expansion. And so Amarr Will Eat Itself (AWEI) was born.

This corporation, fronted by Adri, went on to lead the People’s Republic of Minmatar (PRM), and eventually form the oldest surviving alliance in EVE, Ushra’Khan.

After some time building the foundations of Ushra’Khan in the Molden Heath region (a long time before the Provi-wars we hear of today), I had Adrielle leave the alliance, and AWEI for a time; with older members joining Stormriders, which would later go on to form the Fimbulwinter alliance.

Adri was under the radar in the game for a couple of years while I trained another character on that account. I had her head up a corporation called Minmatarts, with similar principles to AWEI, but without the RP-aspect. Minmatarts folded in June YC108 (2006), and Adrielle returned to a more active role, joining long-time friends Wasteland Miners Inc. (WAM) in their production endeavours as a miner and tech 1 producer, where she would remain for three years.

Only last year when the WAM suffered internal issues – ranging from several thefts to an MIA CEO to offlined POS – did Adrielle gain the backing of other members of the corporation to make a clean break and reinstate operations under the AWEI name with her at the helm again. Since then she’s been building, selling and optimising processes for effective industry along the principles of isk-for-effort rather than isk-per hour.

Kalahari

Kala was originally played by a friend of mine. She was smacky and rude, and subsequently highly entertaining. Originally she lived out in Curse in Black Omega Security corporation, as part of the first iteration of the Curse Alliance.

When I took control of the character, I tried to play her in a similar vein (personality-wise, if not gameplay-wise). This helped to keep the two personas of Adri and Kala separate: since Adri was mostly nice to everyone, and Kala could be heartless and sometimes mean. The trend of ‘good-cop, bad-cop’ social gameplay continued through the Glamour Bunnies/Glamour Syndicate era of YC107-109 (2005-2007), where Kala was perceived as being brash and rough-around-the-edges.

After this point I really stopped caring too much about people knowing that they were both controlled by the same person. Subsequently, Kala has mellowed somewhat over the last few years, but still has an edge to her personality – even when I’m completely out-of-character. This in general is what made her much more fun to play, compared to the more practical concerns of playing Adrielle.

Returning to a more ‘serious’ position, Kala was in Re-Awakened Technologies Inc (ReAw) within the Electus Matari alliance (EM) for a few years before leaving for personal endeavours in March of this year. During her time in EM, she would roleplay, but never to any serious degree, preferring close interactions with small groups than interfering with wider alliance politics.

My actual gameplay with Kala hasn’t really changed much. Primarily she’s always been a mission-runner in my hands. I have spanned out into exploration, but her interactions rely almost exclusively with PVE rather than PVP, unless her home is threatened by piratical types with their hooks and peg legs (1:20 to 3:40).

Summary

Overall, Adrielle has gone from roleplayed to pragmatist. Kala on the other hand has gone from pragmatist to roleplayed, but with much less emphasis on the ‘srsbsns’ side of EVE RP than when I roleplayed Adri.

These days, to put it simply; I play Adri to make isk. I play Kala to have fun.

Other Entries

Other entries to this edition of the banter at the time of writing include:

(Probably) Related Posts

A polite mailThis is what I just sent. I cross my fingers and hope it doesn’t cause me too much aggro. I also apologise in advance if nothing comes of it and I cause a massive shitstorm for my alliance.

YC Year ArchivesHow to get yearly archive lists in Yulai Convention standard for your WordPress blog.

Formatting datesHow to format your WordPress dates, or any dates in PHP from literal year format into that of EVE Online, with the YC number.

Fanfest 2012 AnnouncedFanfest 2012 dates have been announced, along with a devblog and a new mini-website with information on packages and features for the yearly event held in Reykjavik, Iceland.

Time to movePondering on my options when I leave Re-Awakened Technologies.